[Illustration]
On the winter following Celia's departure, Seth fared ill.
It was all he could do to keep warmth in the boy's body and his own,
to get food for their nourishment.
And as for homesickness!
There were nights when he looked at the silver moon, half effaced by
wind-blown clouds, and fought back the tears, thinking how that same
moon was shining down on home and her.
Nights when he fell into very pleasant dreams of that tranquil
beauteous and pleasant country where the wind did not blow. Dreams in
which he beheld flowers, not ragged wind-torn flowers of a parched and
ragged prairie, odorless, colorless flowers and tumbleweeds tossing
weirdly over dusty plains, but flowers of his youth, Four o'Clocks,
Marguerites and Daffy-Down-Dillies, nodding bloomily on either side of
an old brick walk leading from door to gate, Jasmine hanging
redolently from lattice, Virginia Creeper and Pumpkin-vine.
And oh!
A radiant dream! Celia, walking out through vine and flower in all her
fresh young beauty to meet him as in the old days, to open wide the
door and welcome him.
Then as she had done, he waked sobbing, man though he was, but he
hushed his sobs for fear of waking the child.
Homesickness!
He dared not dwell on the word lest his few ideas, scattered already
by the sough of the wind, the incessant moan and sob and wail of the
wind, might blow away altogether; lest he throw to those winds his
pride of independence, his resolute determination to make a home for
her and himself and their child in the West, and go back to her.
This, whatever dreams assailed him, he resolved not to do.
And yet there was one dream which he thrust from him fiercely, afraid
of it, turning pale at the remembrance of it. A dream of a night on
that winter when he had gone to bed hungry.
It was a strange dream and terrible.
He thought it was night, he was out on the prairie, and the wolves
were following him.
They had caught him.
Ravenously they were tearing the flesh from his body in shreds.
He waked in terror to hear the bark of a pack at his door, for in that
winter of bitter cold the wolves also suffered.
"Was that to be his fate?" he asked himself.
Was he to strive and strive, to spend his life in striving, and then
in the working out of destiny, in the survival of the fittest, of the
stronger over the weaker, of those who are able to devour over those
destined to be devoured, fall prey to the fangs of animals hungrier
than he and stronger?
There were times when he was very tired. When almost he was ready to
fold his arms, to give up the fight and say--
"So be it."
But what of the boy then?
Raising himself out of the slough of despond, he resolutely re-fed his
soul with hope.
Those Wise Men! If only they could come! If only they could be made to
see and understand that this was the place for their Magic City and
be persuaded to build it here!
Then all would be well. He would take the boy to Celia, show her how
beautiful he was beginning to be and win her back again.
Then they would all three come and live in a palace in the Magic City,
a beautiful house. Live happy ever after.